He was located Saturday morning, a week later, near Devil’s Canyon – a few miles from where he went missing – when he heard rescuers’ voices and started shouting, the Los Angeles station KTLA reported.

Rescuers told CBS Los Angeles that Jo stayed alive by drinking water from a riverbed and getting close to hot rocks for warmth at night.

Last tweet to share good news. Mr Jo was released from the hospital last night. Here are some photos from the Altadena MRT facebook. pic.twitter.com/CwVXXoF52J

“He would wrap his jacket around him and the beach towel that he had with him,” Janet Henderson of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Search & Rescue, told CBS Los Angeles. “He got in close next to the hot rocks because it is very hot up there and those rocks do heat up and that’s how he kept himself warm at night.”

About 75 people split into 11 teams to search for Jo in the San Gabriel Mountains last week.

“He said it took everything he had to roll over his hands and knees and yell for help and that’s when the rescuers heard him,” Henderson said.

Jo was taken to Huntington Hospital in Pasadena, California, on Saturday but did not appear to have any traumatic injuries. He was released Sunday.

Jo’s daughter, Grace, told CBS Los Angeles that her father was home and “pretty much his old self.”

“He didn’t realise that so many people were looking for him and the extent of where they can from all over the state, and became emotional when he found out just how many, especially because the first time he heard any human voices was the morning he got rescued,” she said. “We’re still barely comprehending the extent of this miracle.”